How do I make myself WANT to lose weight?

Pastel I could seriously copy and paste your post and use it as my own, same exact thing here I look at myself and think the only thing I want is to be thin but then I get a little hungry and reach for the junk or a little thirsty and I feel like I have to have 4 sodas to satisfy it that water wouldn't do it. Ugh it is such a helpless feeling! But knowing that there are really other people out there feeling the same way I do is such a relief, lets keep this thread up and work each other out of the rut! We can totally do it and I can't wait to see our after pics!!

One more thing, eating what I wanted, when I wanted, as much as I wanted - didn't provide me with true happiness. I was always left miserable by it. I deserve the comfort WITHOUT the misery. The *pleasure* is just soooo short lived. I now get pleasure ALL DAY LONG and into the night, by walking around if FABULOUS clothes, I get pleasure from being light, small, healthy, fit, trim, active, energetic, confident, loaded with self worth, self discipline and self respect.

When I read this, it clicked with me. I'm gonna freakin do it this time. I love junk food. but yeah, the minute after i eat it, i feel like i cheated myself and let down. But i never thought about it! i just ignored that feeling! all i remembered was the short pleasure of eating the stuff.
But i want the UNENDING pleasure of being fit. i mean, fit. i wanna be good looking in the nude, in a brown paper sack, in sweats, or whatever i wanna wear!
I choose the long lasting pleasure, over the short lived pleasure of food.
OMG i love you for saying that. lol thank you!!!!

You simply have to want to lose weight more than you want that crappy food.

There is a quote that I absolutely love. It's "Being fat is hard; losing weight is hard. Chose your hard."

It's so simple but it spoke to me. It really did. I can cry over hating my reflection, not being able to wear cute clothes and feeling uncomfortable in my own skin OR I can feel the discomfort of reducing my caloric intake and exercising when I may not feel like it.

Which hard do you want?

ETA: Sorry, didn't realize this was 3 years old. Either way, my feelings are the same... (and I SEROUSLY miss rockinrobin!!!!!)

You need to want it before you actually do it. I was skinny my whole life. I never had to worry about my weight, I could literally down 5 Big Mac's a week and not ever worry about gaining weight. Once I was out of high school though those McDonald's trip caught up to me.

Since I was 17, I've been struggling with losing weight. I would be like "I am going to do this" work out for a week and not even see the scale move and be like "alright well this is worthless" then cry because I wasn't losing weight, then cry because I didn't feel pretty, then cry because I was crying about something that I can fix. Over the years I was so insecure I would wear nothing but sweatpants and hoodies and buy so much makeup just because I felt that was the only thing that would make me pretty. I stopped going to the beach and stopped doing things I loved because I hated the way I looked, and honestly, that is NO way to live.

This year I vowed that I was done complaining about my weight. I was done sitting in my room "wanting" to work out and knowing I should but instead going out to eat, or making excuses as to why I couldn't go to the gym or I was "to tired". You get to a point where you just become DONE. I have come to the rationalization that this weight will not come off easily. I may get down to my goal weight and not look the way I looked in high school, and I'm ok with that.

You need to set mini goals for yourself. If you make this huge goal of "I want to weigh "x" amount of weight rather than "I want to lose 5 pounds before the end of April", it will be harder to stick to your goals because of how huge they look. Start writing down EVERYTHING and I mean EVERYTHING you eat. Seeing it in perspective about what you put in your mouth and how fast calories come into your daily intake, it will shock you. Keep motivational pictures on your phone. It all comes slowly. At first I had NO idea what kind of exercises to do. I would do cardio and abs everyday. With the help of everybody here and other forums, I started venturing around the gym more and trying different things. Eating healthy was the biggest thing for me because I LOVE food. My parents are amazing cooks and so is my boyfriend, so good food is always around me. If I cheat, I eat a small portion if thats the only thing available, if not, everything that I eat now is bought by me and I search for healthier alternatives if I need to. It won't come easy and it will be discouraging at times and I know you will want to quit because everybody hits that wall. But think of all the reasons WHY you want to do this and once you start seeing some results, trust me, you will want to go more and more and more because you start feeling amazing. The biggest thing for me was being able to button my pants and not feel like my jeans were screaming. Good luck and you have a whole community to back you up!

For me one of the big 'ah ha' moments, was realizing that the thinner people around me make healthy choices. They actively plan healthy meals, choose healthier/lighter meals when dining out, go to the gym.

I had the same epiphany a few years ago. For some stupid reason, I had always viewed the thin people around me as "lucky," i.e., they were able to be thin because they were blessed with great metabolisms or because they just didn't love food like I did. Then, one day in the gym, I looked around and realized that most of the people there were normal weight. What do you know?--thin people have to work out, too! I realized then that most people are thin for a reason, not because they have better genes than I.

To the OP, you've gotten some great advice today. Essentially the choice is a hedonistic one (feel good now) or one that focuses on long-term happiness (sacrifice a bit, for an ultimately better life; later those same behaviors don't feel like as much of a sacrifice).

I didn't give up anything--not sugar, not white flour, not alcohol, etc.--but I calorie count, so I can work those things into my plan several times a week. Also, because I exercise so much, I can eat a satisfying number of calories without gaining. I do try to limit the goodies because there is a "tipping point" at which I start overeating sweets, and at that point, I keep wanting more. But this is an individual issue, and I do notice that many people who lose and successfully maintain seem to do so by giving up or reducing sugar, white foods (breads, potatoes). I might be there one day, but it hasn't happened so far. You have to experiment and find out what works best for you.

Loads of great advice in here, so I'll chime in as I've never seen this thread before and I'm sure it's something a lot of people struggle with.

Been there! Still am, occasionally, probably always will be.

On a physical level, I second that loads of refined sugar makes your hunger go screwy. It made me ravenously hungry when my body had absolutely NO need for more food. Like a constant false hunger alarm, with that going off all the time I didn't know when I really needed food. Insulin resistance is the main reason, though it's way more complicated than that if you look at it in detail. Essentially, you're heading for diabetes.

Mentally, it's because you have a choice. One thing gives you pleasure NOW, another one LATER. I'm still working on becoming more patient, because I constantly have to choose between a chocolate bar which is 30 seconds away, and skinny jeans which are a year away. I'm working on developing an exercise addiction to replace my food addiction, so I can get my endorphins from a walk, a swim, or 15 minutes of HIIT rather than a donut. I know the Kate Moss quote "nothing tastes as good as skinny feels" has been much maligned as promoting eating disorders, but I think there's something in it if you look at it from a healthy perspective. Feed yourself, you need food & nutrients to be beautiful. Train at something, you need to move to be beautiful. Over and above that: that takeaway is going to give you nowhere near as much pleasure as being at a healthy weight. The food may give you pleasure now, but it's not going to last. It'll be over before you know it. But when you're whatever your goal is? (for me it's small & strong) - you get to wake up with that EVERY DAY. And it lasts ALL DAY. Provided you look after yourself and maintain it, it's PERMANENT.

A few things, maintenance maintenance maintenance! If you lose weight and get sick of trying, stop trying to lose weight! But instead of going back to old habits, take a maintenance break. Learn what maintenance feels like for you. Maintain after every lb if you have to... As long as you're facing in the right direction, then the only thing standing between you and your goal is time! And that's going to pass whatever you do. I think the saying "a year ago, you'll be glad you started today" applies here. Think of it like your education, you can work for a bit, rest for a bit, repeat, and as long as you keep building up credits, you make it in the end.

Another thing that's helped me swerve round binges is that if I want food that's going to keep me from losing weight, I have to REALLY want it. Like, 9/10 want it. On a scale of 1-10, most of the unhealthy food I was eating, I was eating out of habit & boredom. Not really enjoying it properly. I nearly bought salted caramel chocolate (my favourite) today, but i only 7/10 wanted it. And I wouldn't really have enjoyed it or done it justice. So I'll just have it another time when it's what I really, REALLY want. I've also done occasional swaps of the half-hearted cheap, bad quality, family sized bars of chocolate I used to eat, for expensive, delicious gourmet chocolates that I have to do a 5-mile round trip walk to get at. And I can usually only afford about 3. You know, make it count!

Be disdainful of unhealthy food where you're not getting the absolute BEST. You deserve the best! Make it delicious, enjoy it, and make it count! You are the boss of food, not the other way about.

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2.5 years later... found the way to combine IE with calorie counting!